Sour Patch Kids
by Zubeneschamali
Summary: Missing scene from "Always Buy Retail"; a little more banter back at the station. Written in response to the "sweet" challenge at castle fic.


Title: Sour Patch Kids  
Author: Zubeneschamali  
Rating: K+  
Summary: Missing scene from "Always Buy Retail"; a little more banter back at the station. Written in response to the "sweet" challenge at castle_fic.

Disclaimer: They're not mine, although I adore them both.

A/N: I didn't intend to get sucked into another fandom, really I didn't. But Nathan Fillion is so darn cute...and this scene sprang into my head practically fully-formed. Hope you like it!

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There's no one around but the two of them. Beckett is filling out forms in a regular rhythm that implies she's done it in her sleep at some point in the past. Castle is just standing around her desk because he's supposed to be observing her, and he's figured out by now that only showing up for the exciting and scary parts wouldn't be fair to the people who live this job every day.

There also might be the tiniest bit of need on his part to be around someone who knows how to use a gun after the harrowing afternoon he had, but he's not even going to admit that to his subconscious.

"So has she moved in yet?" Beckett's rich voice cuts through the near-silence of the after-hours station, but she doesn't look up from the paragraph she's writing.

"Uh, no." It's funny that neither of them needs to specify who she's talking about. He's been watching this place and its people for a while now, and the way that personal conversations resume out of nowhere whenever there's a moment of downtime fascinates him. His job is solitary by nature, so this business of not only being around the same people all day, but spending more time with them than with your loved ones, is strange to him. "There's actually a good chance she won't be coming back to New York at all," Castle adds.

"I thought it was a done deal." She half-turns to look at him, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

"Let's just say the fat lady hasn't started warbling yet." He's got his fingers crossed, but he can't know for sure that his contacts in L.A. did their thing. "And while there's life, there's hope."

She raises an eyebrow and turns back to the paperwork, tapping the end of her ballpoint pen against the desk as she considers an empty box on the form. "So I gotta wonder, Castle: if your ex-wife is a deep-fried Twinkie, what does that make you?"

He's only a few steps behind her chair, so it's almost too easy to step forward and slide his hands down the back of the chair so that they're supporting his weight on the armrests. It's really simple to swiftly bend down so his head is right next to hers, close enough that sweet floral shampoo and a trace of dried sweat fill his nostrils. It's natural to put his mouth next to her ear and breathe softly, "I don't know, Detective. You haven't gotten to taste me yet."

He listens carefully and starts to put on his playboy grin when he hears the tiny catch in her breath and sees her hands freeze on the photocopied pages. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees her turn to look at him, drawing her head back slightly. But instead of the wide-eyed, trembling woman he expects to see, there's a predatory gleam in her dark eyes. And too late, he remembers that sexy-as-hell dress she blew him away with at the book signing and the sheer glee she's taken in throwing out "kitten" at the most inappropriate moments.

So when her head darts forward and her tongue pokes out of her mouth just enough for the tip to brush wetly against his cheek, he's frozen in place in disbelief.

"Mmm, sweet." Her husky voice actually sends a shiver over him, and the smirk on her face is all too clear as she turns away and gives her swivel chair a jerk forward so that his arms fall away. "Like Sour Patch Kids."

"Like wha—?" Castle manages to get out. Then he straightens up and clears his throat. He's the one who's supposed to making inappropriate comments here, damn it. Doesn't she know how this works?

"Sour Patch Kids." Beckett goes on without looking up, "You know, those chewy candies that are coated with sugar on the outside and are so sweet so they almost hurt your teeth when you first suck on them?" She checks off a couple of boxes and continues blithely, "And then there's this sour kind of bite underneath that gets too be too much if you have more than a few at a time. Still, it's fun to bite their little heads off."

He knows his eyebrows are pulling together into a frown, but his snappy comeback abilities are inexplicably failing him at the moment.

Then she casts a look at him over her shoulder. "Although they _are_ gummy candies, so if you stick with them for a while, they get all soft and pliable."

Castle's jaw continues to gape for only a moment before he retorts, "You mean if you _suck_ on them for a while."

But his phrasing is a little too jerky to be a true comeback, and her eyes twinkle as she turns back around, knowing she's won. "This is going to be another hour of boring, Castle. You might as well head home."

Any other time, he'd be tempted to stay and figure out how to get her back, but there _is_ the strong possibility that Meredith got some very good news today, so he tries not to feel like he's slinking away in defeat as he makes his way out.

"Sour Patch Kids?" he mutters in the elevator, and the janitor who's riding down to the ground floor with him gives him a weird look.

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The next morning when Beckett gets to her office, there's a small white box with a wire handle sitting on her desk, like a Chinese takeout box but without the grease. She knows what's in it before she opens it, but she still grins at the sugar-coated pastel candies inside. She pops one in her mouth and chews, the bright flavor sparking across her taste buds and waking up the remaining parts of her that the espresso hasn't already taken care of.

She's always been fond of sharp contrasts all rolled up into one neat package.


End file.
